Create Now - Programs / writing

Kids Involved in Create a Mural Now Workshop

Click here to learn about our "Create A Mural Now" workshops, where youth work as a team to design and create a mural. The theme can fit your needs. Each project culminates with a party and gift bags for all participants.

Writing Programs - Write Now

With the goal of improving literacy, youth are taught to express themselves in positive ways through screenwriting, poetry, short stories, plays, song lyrics, essays, spoken word and news articles. We have an extensive library of screenplays and books that are shared with interested students and used as teaching tools.

Students are also invited to attend poetry readings and to share public presentations of their work. Each year, our performance of "LA Street Scenes" showcases the work of some of the youth in our Write Now program.

Featured Workshop: "Baby Talk"

A former staff writer at the San Francisco Chronicle, Kelly Regier is an Emmy-award winning journalist who now works as a freelance writer. She is also a stay-at-home mother to two daughters, ages 3 and 5. Thanks to a generous grant from Oprah’s Angel Network, Kelly mentored a group of teenage mothers at Mary’s Shelter in Santa Ana. Here’s her story.

By Kelly St. John Regier

Some things are just inevitable. New mothers want to talk about their babies. So it was this spring, with our creative writing workshop at Mary’s Academy in Santa Ana – a program for pregnant and parenting teen girls. They were most inspired to write about, and for, their own children.

One week, we brainstormed about babies, filling a white board with words like “innocent,” “angel,” and “love” that they used to write poems. In another class, students wrote letters for their children to read when they are older, cataloging details of their pregnancies or childhood milestones that may be forgotten later on.

Read the girls' poetry here....

Read about some of our previous Featured Workshops

The First OUTing

Write in Our Own Backyard

Creative Writing at Optimist Youth Home

Special thanks to our Write Now program sponsors:

We thank Oprah's Angel Network for making this project possible through their support of the Write Now literacy program.